Ted Snider

This horrible war that could have been avoided, shouldn’t have been launched and could have been ended early through a negotiated settlement has reached an unimagined brink. The major parties to the war, Russia, Ukraine and the US, can continue on the path of escalation and go over the brink, or they can start to … Continue reading “If Kennedy Hadn’t Listened to Khrushchev”

On September 27, referendums on joining Russia in the Donbas republics of Donetsk and Luhansk and in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts were completed. The referendum in Donbas, which has already declared its independence, asked "Do you support the entry of the DPR into the Russian Federation as a subject of the Russian Federation?" In … Continue reading “Referendums and Joining Russia”

On September 21, President Biden addressed the United Nations General Assembly. Taking Territory by Force Biden opened his address by accusing Russia of violating "the core tenets of the United Nations Charter – no more important than the clear prohibition against countries taking the territory of their neighbor by force." He is quite right that … Continue reading “Fact-Checking Biden’s UN Speech”

As early as the end of April, Russia’s view of the war may already have begun evolving from seeing it as a regional war to seeing it as a wider war with the US and NATO. At that time, the voracious provision of weapons combined with training and real-time intelligence on targeting led Russian foreign … Continue reading “Russia’s Evolving Attitude Toward the War”

As a child growing up in Leningrad, Vladimir Putin lived in a run-down five-story building. He and his parents shared an apartment with two other families. The yard was filled with garbage, and the garbage was filled with rats. "Putin and his friends used to chase after them with sticks, until one day a large … Continue reading “Putin: Lessons From Childhood”

An intelligence review commissioned by the Biden administration has concluded that "Russia has secretly funneled at least $300 million to foreign political parties and candidates in more than two dozen countries since 2014 in an attempt to shape political events beyond its borders." On September 12, the State Department shared the information with US embassies … Continue reading “US Accuses Russia of Interfering in Foreign Elections”

The first world leader to call President George W. Bush after 9/11 was Vladimir Putin. In fact, he had called him two days before, on September 9, to warn Bush that, based on unfolding events he had observed in the environment, he had "a foreboding that something was about to happen, something long in preparation." … Continue reading “Remembering Our Friends on 9/11”

The horrific war in Ukraine is, tragically, far from over with no end in sight. Whether the world that emerges will be unipolar or multipolar, one thing is certain: the world is now more polarized. The war in Ukraine is a threshold that, having been crossed, forces Russia to face two certain premises. The first … Continue reading “How the War Is Choreographing Russia’s New Stance”

When Western history sings its own song, it tells the tale of triumph over the Soviet Union bringing the Cold War to an end. But that is never what happened, and the events went the other way around. Mikhail Gorbachev, who passed away on August 30, was a visionary who first negotiated the end of … Continue reading “If Only We’d Listened: Mikhail Gorbachev”

On August 22, in response to the question, "Under what conditions is Russia ready to resort to the use of nuclear weapons," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov cited the "Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the field of nuclear deterrence.” He said that Russia "hypothetically" could allow the use of … Continue reading “Ukraine and Russia: A Dangerous Tale of Two Speeches”